Both the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency have embraced the homosexual movement, posing a new threat to the country’s sexual morals and to pro-family activists, according to Brian Camenker of the Massachusetts pro-life and pro-family organization MassResistance.

Poor Brian Camenker. It must be tough going through life with no sense of irony.

Last October, we learned that Federal authorities have dropped charges against Mennonite minister Timothy “Timo” Miller, who was arrested last spring and charged with aiding and abetting in the kidnapping of Isabella Miller-Jenkins, specifically for purchasing airline tickets for the Isabella and Lisa Miller to Nicaragua. Miller, who is not related to Lisa Miller or to Isabella, was reportedly cooperating with the ongoing investigation into the kidnapping. Since then, another Mennonite minister, Kenneth Miller, was arrested and charged with aiding in Isabela’s international kidnapping conspiracy. The Advocate looked into the affidavit against Kenneth Miller, and discovered that the conspirators suggested using Life Site News, an unofficial Catholic anti-gay web site, could be used as an intermediary for communications:

In one November 2010 email exchange from addresses linked to Kenneth Miller and Timo Miller, Kenneth Miller allegedly expressed concern about the whereabouts of Lisa Miller and Isabella. Referencing an October 2010 news article on Lez Get Real reporting that Miller and her daughter were in Quito, Ecuador, Kenneth Miller wrote to Timo Miller in Nicaragua, “Is she still in the same country that she was? Can you get a hold of her?” The email was written in a mix of English and Pennsylvania German, a dialect spoken by some Mennonites.

“When we still want, we can send a letter about her through this, and we can get it mailed from another country over here. We can send it to a site that’s called lifesitenews,” Kenneth Miller continued in the email, according to a translation by an FBI contract linguist. “That’s a way that to get word to [unintelligible] friends. What do you think of that?”

The affidavit shows that Miller appeared surprised by the reference to Quito, Ecuador. “I don’t believe it,” he wrote, “but have you heard anything like that? Is she still in the same country that she was?…” Melanie Nathan, who had been an author at LezGetReal but left before it was revealed that the blog’s main writer was a hoax, now says that she believes the story she wrote placing Isabella at Quito was based on fraudulent “tips” passed to her by LezGetReal’s fake lesbian “Paula Brooks” (real name: Bill Graber). That would explain Miller’s apparent astonishment about reports of Isabella’s whereabouts and his desire to learn whether she was “still in the same country that she was,” namely Nicaragua.

The Advocate, which posted its story shortly before Christmas, notes that Life Site News has written extensively about the Miller-Jenkins kidnapping:

Relatives say the family was partially prompted to pursue therapy out of concern for how Kirk’s father, Rod, acted colder towards his younger son than to Mark, the elder brother.

“They said he had to go to UCLA because of his relationship with his dad,” said Kirk’s cousin Donna, according to Burroway. “They said it was Rod’s fault because he didn’t love Kirk enough.”

Gender identity therapists have recognized a lack of affection from one’s father as a risk factor for males developing gender identity disorders.

That, of course, is not at all why Kaytee took Kirk to UCLA. It was, rather, an explanation given to a child as recalled from Donna’s childhood. Here is the actual context from which Gilbert ripped her fanciful tale:

Mark clearly remembers a “before” and “after” with Kirk’s treatment. His memory is helped by the fact that they moved to a new house in 1969, just before Kirk entered treatment. And so he recalls with confidence that the family deteriorated noticeably during and following Kirk’s therapy. “I can remember a clear difference with our parents in our first house,” he said. “There was none of the ranting and raving, the fighting and drinking. Boy, that sure came after that.” Rod always drank some — “Those Irish Murphys you know,” Kaytee said, “they liked their beers!” — and so she doesn’t attribute Rod’s worsening drinking to the stresses surrounding Kirk’s therapy. But worsen it did, and that added more friction in the family.

Rod was clearly under a lot of pressure. While psychologists had placed a great deal of emphasis on the mother’s role in their children’s development, researchers at UCLA (Rekers included) were turning their attention more directly toward fathers in deciding which parent was more at fault in making a child “prehomosexual.” Donna remembered overhearing the adults in the family blaming Rod for Kirk’s “problem.”

“They said he had to go to UCLA because of his relationship with his dad,” she said. “They said it was Rod’s fault because he didn’t love Kirk enough. Kirk wasn’t interested in sports the way Mark was, and he would play sports more with Mark. Kirk was quieter and more interested in music. And I know it was discussed that he didn’t love his son enough. I don’t believe that was true, but there was a discussion that I remember.” Rod remained resistant to taking Kirk to UCLA. “I don’t think he bought into the whole thing,” she said.

But Gilbert selects this recollection to present as support for her fanciful fiction.

After the sessions finished, the Murphys were instructed to continue encouraging normative behavior on a token reinforcement system, using red and blue poker chips to reinforce both gender-related and other habits. Rekers concluded at a three-year follow-up session that the child’s more masculine habits “have become normalized,” and the therapy was deemed a success.

However, according to the family’s recollections, the reinforcement regimen took an ugly turn when brought back home: instead of the “spanking” advised for Kirk’s misbehavior, according to his children and wife Rod Murphy physically abused his son so violently that Kirk’s sister Maris recalls hiding in her room under pillows to avoid hearing Kirk’s screams. Mark Murphy broke down in tears as he recalled how he would try to save his younger brother from his father’s beatings.

Again, Gilbert’s tale has as little to do with Kirk’s life as does Rekers’ fictitious “Kraig” reports. And the motivation is the same.

Like George Rekers, Kathleen Gilbert isn’t interested in the truth. She despises the truth, prefering lies that advance her church’s doctrine, especially that which demeans gay people and enforces civil inequalities. And, sadly, she is more than willing to abuse a family already the victim of those who share her view of the world.

It’s hard to understand just what compels someone like Gilbert to cause needless pain to the Murphy family. How can she hurt others just to advance a political doctrine, and yet consider herself to be an advocate for God? What kind of person would willfully disregard the truth in a quest for heterosexual supremacy and Catholic privilege?

Those who read here will know that there are a few words we use very sparingly. But it is hard for me to think of Kathleen Gilbert and her deliberate abuse of this story in terms other than “evil”.

If Peter LaBarbera were on RuPaul’s Drag Race, no doubt a competitor would have told him in last night’s “reading session” that he is a petty vindictive bitch who wouldn’t know honesty and integrity if it ripped the wig off his big balding pate.

But drag queens are famous for over-the-top rhetoric so I will use less dramatic language and just comment that it appears that his personal vendetta against Warren Throckmorton has little interest in fact.

It all started back in February when Dr. Throckmorton dared to mock LaBarbera by calling Martin Ssempa “the leader of the Ugandans for Truth About Homosexuality Pastor’s Task Force Against Homosexuality”. While LaBarbera considers Ssempa to be a fellow warrior (with quite similar tactics), he knows that the comparison to him wasn’t meant to be complementary.

Actually, it is likely that resentment has been brewing for a good deal longer. Peter LaBarbera thrives on attention – indeed requires attention to fund his organization and his salary. And while Dr. Throckmorton has quite frequently been called upon by prominent Christian magazines for his views on homosexuality, LaBarbera has been left picking up the crumbs on the fringe pages, sharing his limelight with those who think being gay is caused by soy products.

So over the past month, LaBarbera has been conducting war on Throckmorton. And he’s called in the lunatic fringe to help; haters, extremists, birthers, conspiracy theorists, and those for whom we are concerned about their mental state were all happy to jump right in.

The latest to hitch their caboose to his wackadoodle train is LifeSiteNews, a lay-Catholic news site. Regurgitating a message clearly fed to them by The Peter, LifeSite makes the usual accusations: Throckmorton endorses pro-gay legislation (he hasn’t), Throckmorton is morally neutral on homosexuality (he isn’t), and Throckmorton has abandoned ex-homosexuals (he took a closer look and was unwilling to lie about what he saw).

And, of course, they include the contact information for Dr. Throckmorton and his employer, just in case their readers want to send hate mail or to demand that he be fired.

I doubt such efforts will be effective. Throckmorton has used his website to set the record straight. And Warren is well respected (and well connected) and should any evangelical leaders have further concerns, they can just pick up the phone and call him. Further, those who sign on to join in the nastiness may come to find that such behavior threatens their own credibility.

But it is sad to see this vindictive attack. It is vicious, petty, dishonest, morally repugnant, and totally unnecessary.

Come to think of it, I think I owe drag queens an apology. LaBarbera would never be allowed on RuPaul’s Drag Race or any other drag venue. While I’ve heard some outrageous statements and seen some questionable outfits (and watched more than a little terrible lip syncing), I have never seen a drag queen this lacking in basic decency.

LifeSiteNews was originally launched in 1997 by Campaign Life Coalition, a Canadian national pro-life organization, as a news source for those opposed to legal abortion. Since that time it has broadened its interests to include euthanasia, cloning, homosexuality, and other social issues and currently its readership is primarily in the United States.

LifeSiteNews is generally well written (though biased) and informative and often will have stories that have not caught the attention of mainstream media, especially those which are international in scope. But it must be read with the understanding that it has a strong sectarian slant and is perhaps best viewed as an unofficial lay voice of the Roman Catholic Church.

Today, LifeSiteNews published an article that was unexpected. The Editor, John-Henry Westen, interviewed Scott Lively and echoed without question his statements about homosexuality in Uganda and the current effort underway to pass legislation to execute HIV positive gay people, incarcerate other gay people for life, and jail those family, friends, or acquaintances who do not report suspected gay people to the government. While Westen’s biases make him ready to believe the worst about gay people, however irrational, it was surprising the extent to which Lively’s word was taken as unvarnished truth.

Scott Lively is an unusual anti-gay activist. He does not stop at moral concern, cultural discomfort, or objection based in ignorance, stereotype, or unfamiliarity. Rather, Lively travels the world marketing in anti-gay lies and myths and seeking to inflame hatred and instigate outrage and social oppression of gay people on an international scale.

Lively is the author of The Pink Swastika, a book whose premise is that the Nazis were primarily a homosexual organization and that gays were responsible for the Holocaust. While this is a laughable assertion dismissed by historians and holocaust groups, it is read, believed, and treasured in countries where animus against gay people is strong and an excuse to hate gay people is welcomed without question.

According to the reported interview in LifeSiteNews, Lively is spinning a peculiar message. Lively says that laws against homosexuality should be on the books but only sporadically enforced. This keeps gays oppressed and support for their social inclusion forbidden.

He testified to lawmakers in the Ugandan Assembly Hall that having legislation against homosexuality on the books is important since it protects against those who would advocate in public and in schools that homosexuality is positive.

While Lively makes sure to say that the bill as proposed is “too harsh”, his primary objective in the interview was to lay the blame for any excesses in the bill on reasonable reaction to “the heavy-handed pressure from international gay-activist politicians on Uganda to accept homosexuality as normal.”

In fact, as Dr. Scott Lively, the President of Defend the Family pointed out, the preamble to the bill, and the bill itself contain numerous references to stopping international pressure on Uganda to accept Western sexual values that are abhorrent to Ugandan culture.

The bill states explicitly that it aims “at providing a comprehensive and enhanced legislation to protect the cherished culture of the people of Uganda.” The goal is to protect the “legal, religious, and traditional family values of the people of Uganda against the attempts of sexual rights activists seeking to impose their values of sexual promiscuity on the people of Uganda.”

Dr. Lively, a pro-family activist and attorney based in California was in Uganda in March to testify before Ugandan legislators now considering the legislation. In an interview with LifeSiteNews (LSN), Dr. Lively explained that the impetus for the bill was “a lot of external interference from European and American gay activists attempting to do in Uganda what they’ve done around the world – homosexualize that society.” One of their main concerns, explained Lively, “are the many male homosexuals coming in to the country and abusing boys who are on the streets.”

The Catholic Church’s position on the “Kill Gays” bill is less clearly defined. However, as LifeSiteNews summarizes, they too are taking a “blame it on the foreign gays” approach:

While the Catholic leadership in the nation has not yet responded publicly to the proposed bill, they have consistently expressed outrage at the attempts of the West to impose acceptance of homosexuality on the country. Last month at the Synod for Africa at the Vatican, bishops from all over the continent noted their grave concerns over the international anti-family pressure.

Summing up the discussions, the Cardinal Archbishop of Cape Coast, Ghana, Peter Turkson, said that the Synod had “described in various ways a ferocious onslaught on the family and the related fundamental institution of marriage from outside Africa and attributed it to diverse sources.” The bishops, he said, “vigorously denounced the ideology and international programs which are imposed on African countries under false pretexts or as conditions for development assistance.”

This may not be a conclusive endorsement of the bill by the Catholic Church – and indeed the death penalty goes in opposition to the position of the Vatican. However, it would appear that the Catholic Church is, in at least some venues, indicating that it will not speak out in opposition to this draconian piece of legislation.

A Duke University official has been charged in federal court with offering his 5-year-old adopted son up for sex. Frank Lombard, associate director of the Center for Health Policy, was arrested Wednesday in Raleigh, the FBI said.

An unidentified informant who already faces child porn charges in a different child sex case pointed investigators to Lombard, according to court documents. The informant told investigators he had met Lombard on the Internet four years ago. The informant described in graphic detail how he allegedly observed Lombard molesting an African-American child on four occasions over an Internet video chat service called ICUii.

…During the chats, according to the affidavit, “FL” [Frank Lombard’s screen name] told undercover investigators that he had himself molested his child, whom he adopted as an infant, and that he had allowed others to molest his child. “FL” stated that “the abuse of the child was easier when the child was too young to talk or know what was happening, but that he had drugged the child with Benadryl during molestation.”

Predictably, anti-gay extremists are already using this horrific crime as “proof” that all gay people are unfit to be parents. They’ll tell you that this is how virtually all gay men behave. LifeSite is already eating it up, as are Dakota Voice’s Bob Ellis and Town Hall’s Mike Adams.

We’ve seen them equate homosexuality with pedophilia by tagging the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act with the libelous “Pedophile Protection Act” moniker. Adams piled onto that them by following his first post up with another one noting that Lombard was Facebook Fan with Rev. Gene Robinson, the first openly gay Bishop of the Anglican Church. The Right Rev. Robinson has 3,668 other fans, but that didn’t deter Adams from asking, “Is this arrest thwarting an effort by Lombard to promote tolerance of pedophilia in the Episcopal Church?”

Kiliann Melloy has a great rundown on anti-gay reactions to Lombard’s arrest at EDGE Boston, including a blog which claims to be a “grassroots network of the Republican Party of Virginia.” And she reviews the contention by Paul Cameron and another so-called “researcher,” Dr. Judith Reisman, that gay men are more likely to molest children. (Reisman’s Ph.D. is in Communications, but as Melloy notes, that doesn’t stop her from writing about the physiological effects of pornography on the brain without the aid of any research.)

The lesson we ought to learn from Lombard’s arrest is that being a horrible, abusive parent is an equal-opportunity crime. Gay individuals are no more immune from engaging in criminal conduct with five-year-olds than straight people. Like this heterosexual couple from Indiana, just to name one tragic example.

To learn more about what research says about homosexuality and child abuse, see our report, "Testing the Premise: Are Gays A Threat To Our Children?"

But it’s gay men in particular which get the blame for molesting children. Anti-gay activists will claim that gay men are guilty of this horrible crime in numbers far exceeding their proportion in the overall population. The problem with that assertion though is that there is absolutely no evidence to support that claim. That’s not to say that there are no gay predators. But there is no evidence to suggest that gay men are more likely to molest children than straight men, which is the fear-mongering message that extremists return to again and again.

The real tragedy in this case is that a very young boy has been horribly abused. The crime that anti-gay extremists engage in by slandering all gay people with this episode is, without a doubt, the much lesser crime. But it is a crime nevertheless, and it’s one they will have to answer for someday. Just like this Lombard bastard.

And so today we have triple-header: three Certified Cameronite Awards go to Gilbert, LifeSite and OneNewsNow. And to add to that, we have a full denunciation from a UK researcher whose study she misrepresented. That’s a home run! Congratulations.

A British researcher has denounced two North American anti-gay web sites for distorting his research. University College London professor Michael King, in a statement to Box Turtle Bulletin, clarified the findings of his research on depression and suicide among LGB people, and emphasized the importance that “all sectors of society welcome them as equal and valuable citizens.”

A new study in the United Kingdom has revealed that homosexuals are about 50% more likely to suffer from depression and engage in substance abuse than the rest of the population, reports Health24.com.

After analyzing 25 earlier studies on sexual orientation and mental health, researchers, in a study published in the medical journal BMC Psychiatry, also found that the risk of suicide jumped over 200% if an individual had engaged in a homosexual lifestyle.

The LifeSite/OneNewsNow article claims that the study proves lesbians, gays and bisexuals experience this risk not because of stigma or discrimination, but because homosexuality itself is a mental disorder:

Dr. Rick Fitzgibbons, a psychiatrist and member of the Catholic Medical Association, says there is evidence that homosexuality is itself a manifestation of a psychological disorder accompanied by a host of mental health problems, including “major depression, suicidal ideation and attempts, anxiety disorders, substance abuse, conduct disorder, low self-esteem in males and sexual promiscuity with an inability to maintain committed relationships.”

The BMC Psychiatry article by professor Michael King and colleagues is available online for free. This means that you don’t have to take anyone’s word for anything; you can read it yourself. And as you do, you’ll notice that the study bears little resemblance to Gilbert’s description of it.

First, the authors make it clear that participating in a “homosexual lifestyle” — and by that I presume Gilbert means sexual activity — is not a necessary risk factor. The studies that the authors analyzed defined homosexuality and bisexuality by many different standards, including sexual attractions and identity apart from behavior.

The authors also make it clear that while lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people appear to be at greater risk than heterosexual people of mental disorders and suicidal behavior:

LGB people are subject to institutionalised prejudice, social stress, social exclusion (even within families) and anti-homosexual hatred and violence and often internalise a sense of shame about their sexuality.

And:

Although our evidence does not specify the nature of such mechanisms, there is no evidence to suggest that homosexuality is itself a disorder that is thereby subject to a higher co-morbidity than is found in heterosexuals.

In fact, even if Gilbert hadn’t seen the study itself — even though it is available online — her “report” doesn’t even bear much resemblance to the Health24.com article that she claims to cite but doesn’t link.

We asked Professor King for his reaction to the LifeSite/OneNewsNow article. This was his reply:

LifeSite News and OneNewsNow have misinterpreted our review. Evidence from around the world identifies the main stressors leading to mental distress in gay and lesbian people as discrimination, prejudice, bullying in schools and colleges, and the consequent need for many LGB people to keep their homosexual identity secret, even from their families.

Our review did not examine links between mental disorder and homosexual “behaviour” or “lifestyle”. Our work reviewed studies of the mental health of lesbian, gay and bisexual people, and sadly, those studies showed that it is people (not behaviour) that are discriminated against, and not least by religious groups and organisations.

Discrimination on the grounds of sexuality is even more devastating than other forms of discrimination such as racism, as it reaches right into families and leaves no refuge for its victims.

We suggest in our review that the availability of alcohol and drugs at gay social venues may be a factor in the greater risk of drug and alcohol misuse in LGB people. Reducing this problem is something for which LGB people must take greater responsibility. However, the fact that discrimination still exists in our societies means that many are forced to use such venues to meet each other rather than through more common ways available to heterosexuals, such as at work, during the pursuit of hobbies and past-times, or at church.

There is now abundant evidence that homosexuality is not itself a mental disorder and that it is compatible with a healthy lifestyle. We shall only begin to see a reduction in mental distress and deliberate self harm in LGB people when all sectors of society welcome them as equal and valuable citizens.

To throw more confusion into the mix, Gilbert tossed in a discredited 2007 study by Nazi-apologist Paul Cameron which supposedly demonstrated that “that the lifespan of a homosexual is on average 24 years shorter than that of a heterosexual.” She also used Cameron’s study to claim that discrimination hat nothing to do with it, saying that, “Homosexuals in the United States and Denmark – the latter of which is acknowledged to be highly tolerant of homosexuality – both die on average in their early 50’s, or in their 40’s if AIDS is the cause of death.”

Gilbert’s brief article in LifeSite and OneNewsNow combines the worst misrepresentations of legitimate science coupled with the worst example of phony pseudoscience — all in six short paragraphs. That’s quite a remarkable if dubious achievement. What Gilbert lacks in veracity, she certainly makes up for in ingenuity — and audacity. Maybe someday she’ll decide the truth ought to play a role as well. Somehow I doubt it.

[Thanks to regular reader Stefano A. for his help in gathering material for this post.]

The unofficial Roman Catholic LifeSiteNews is an amazing piece of work. They managed to turn a study about large families into an anti-gay tract. And Paul Cameron was right there to help them:

While the UM study shows the health benefits of the traditional large family, other recent studies have revealed the health dangers of non-traditional social relations.

A recent study found that individuals taking part in legal same-sex “marriages” in Norway and Denmark lived 24 fewer years than individuals in traditional marriages, Drs. Paul and Kirk Cameron reported at the 2007 annual Eastern Psychological Association convention.

The man has no shame whatsoever. Not only was his so-called “study” completely bogus and easily refuted, Cameron is still repeating the lie that he “reported” his study at the 2007 annual Eastern Psychological Association convention. You may remember we obtained a statement from EPA president Dr. Phil Hineline exposing Cameron’s boldface lie just a little over a year ago.

Suffice to say that Dr. Cameron is not simply ideologically opposed to homosexuality, he is fixated on “solutions” that I find abhorrent. I call on fellow social conservatives who still refer to the Camerons’ work to take a hard look at these posts and reflect on whether someone with such extreme animosity could possibly approach social science data with sufficient objectivity to be trusted.

Courage:

Concerned Women For America:

Indianapolis Rejects Domestic Partner Benefit — Robert H. Knight, Aug 2, 2002
“The author of the bill was very articulate and tried to come after me for using a Paul Cameron study (although I did not cite him. I cited Adolescence journal).”

In this original BTB Investigation, we unveil the tragic story of Kirk Murphy, a four-year-old boy who was treated for “cross-gender disturbance” in 1970 by a young grad student by the name of George Rekers. This story is a stark reminder that there are severe and damaging consequences when therapists try to ensure that boys will be boys.

When we first reported on three American anti-gay activists traveling to Kampala for a three-day conference, we had no idea that it would be the first report of a long string of events leading to a proposal to institute the death penalty for LGBT people. But that is exactly what happened. In this report, we review our collection of more than 500 posts to tell the story of one nation’s embrace of hatred toward gay people. This report will be updated continuously as events continue to unfold. Check here for the latest updates.

In 2005, the Southern Poverty Law Center wrote that “[Paul] Cameron’s ‘science’ echoes Nazi Germany.” What the SPLC didn”t know was Cameron doesn’t just “echo” Nazi Germany. He quoted extensively from one of the Final Solution’s architects. This puts his fascination with quarantines, mandatory tattoos, and extermination being a “plausible idea” in a whole new and deeply disturbing light.

From the Inside: Focus on the Family’s “Love Won Out”

On February 10, I attended an all-day “Love Won Out” ex-gay conference in Phoenix, put on by Focus on the Family and Exodus International. In this series of reports, I talk about what I learned there: the people who go to these conferences, the things that they hear, and what this all means for them, their families and for the rest of us.

Using the same research methods employed by most anti-gay political pressure groups, we examine the statistics and the case studies that dispel many of the myths about heterosexuality. Download your copy today!

Anti-gay activists often charge that gay men and women pose a threat to children. In this report, we explore the supposed connection between homosexuality and child sexual abuse, the conclusions reached by the most knowledgeable professionals in the field, and how anti-gay activists continue to ignore their findings. This has tremendous consequences, not just for gay men and women, but more importantly for the safety of all our children.

Anti-gay activists often cite the “Dutch Study” to claim that gay unions last only about 1½ years and that the these men have an average of eight additional partners per year outside of their steady relationship. In this report, we will take you step by step into the study to see whether the claims are true.

Tony Perkins’ Family Research Council submitted an Amicus Brief to the Maryland Court of Appeals as that court prepared to consider the issue of gay marriage. We examine just one small section of that brief to reveal the junk science and fraudulent claims of the Family “Research” Council.

The FBI’s annual Hate Crime Statistics aren’t as complete as they ought to be, and their report for 2004 was no exception. In fact, their most recent report has quite a few glaring holes. Holes big enough for Daniel Fetty to fall through.